A Wolf at the Door

“Fuck it.” At the last possible building, I threw my shoulder against the locked door, and spilled us both into the dark soundstage. Surely there was something in here we could use. I kicked the door shut behind us, for all the good it would do, and held tightly to Gretchen’s hand as we picked our way through the darkness.

The sound of the door splintering to bits behind us was amazingly loud, and Gretchen’s grip on my hand tightened as she flinched. I squeezed it back, hopefully reassuring, and kept going.

There were things in the way, old equipment we stumbled against, wires and cords we tripped over. And all the while, the thing behind us was just smashing his way through, metal screeching as he shoved speakers and lights and scaffolding out of the way.

One hand stretched in front of me, I felt the wall before I plowed into it face-first, and my heart sank. A second later, I found the door. That was better. “Through here.”

We found ourselves in a hallway of some kind, Gretchen’s shoes echoing hollowly against the tile flooring. On the upside, there was a light at the end of the tunnel, literally. We dashed toward it. Behind us, we heard the hallway door ripped off its hinges.

The light was an industrial-grade kitchen, white and sterile. Stainless steel appliances ringed the large room, broken up with immaculate white countertops. My eyes were only for the butcher block, prominently placed on a cooking island. I snatched a French knife out of the wood, quickly testing the edge with my thumb, satisfied when it drew a thin line of blood. No movie prop here, either.

Pushing Gretchen behind me again, I turned to face what was coming down the hallway, bracing myself for whatever was about to come.

And then ninjas dropped through the ceiling.

11

I’m not kidding you. Ninjas. Actual ninjas, in their black pajamas and hoods, all harnessed into ropes and clutching a variety of weapons. Most of the “ninjas” were holding their weapons all wrong, I noted.

They blinked at us, and we blinked at them, and then someone shrieked “CUT!!!” The wall of the kitchen behind us gave a groan and slowly rolled out of the way, revealing a team of very perplexed-looking movie-type folk.

Glancing back at the hallway, I could see the shadowy figure of our centurion filling the walkway, then he slowly faded back into the darkness of the soundstage. Within moments, he, and my goose bumps, were gone.

“It took me three hours to set those cameras.” The shrieking voice had quieted, but it was that quiet that said “Boy am I pissed off.” “Would someone mind telling me what fucking moron is responsible for wasting three hours of my life?!”

The ninjas were quickly unbuckling themselves from harnesses, muttering among themselves, and the crew cleared a path for what I will assume was one pissed-off director. Frankly, as portly and round as the guy was, he wasn’t physically intimidating, but his unkempt beard was bristling in all directions in his fury, and it was obvious that when he wasn’t happy, no one was happy.

“Just who the fuck do you think you—” I could tell the moment he recognized Gretchen, because he nearly choked in an effort to swallow whatever curse words were about to spew forth. “Gretchen! Oh, honey, I didn’t recognize you! What in the world are you doing here?”

“Lars!” Instantly, Gretchen drew herself up, pasting on a gracious smile, and exchanged air kisses with the hairy angry man. “I’m so sorry. I was showing a friend around, and we didn’t know anyone was using this stage. The light over the backdoor must be burned out.”

Damn. The girl lied good. While Hairy Angry Lars was distracted, I dared a glance at the small disk on my key chain collection, intended to warn me of danger. The colored surface was just settling into a deep blue, and as I watched, it faded to purple, then back to black. Just like a mood ring. I had to wonder what color it had been when the mysterious Roman centurion was trying to mash me like a potato.

Fidgeting with Cam’s disk gave me a closer look at my hands, and I grimaced. Somewhere, no doubt stumbling through the darkened soundstage, I’d gotten into something, and it was all over my hands. Gray paint, maybe, though it flaked off as I brushed at it. Wet plaster?

“This is Jesse. Jesse, this is Lars. He directed two of the films I was in last year.” Gretchen directed his attention toward me, and belatedly, I remembered that I had a rather large knife in one hand. I quickly slipped it back into the block, pretending that nothing at all was amiss. Nothing to see here, move along.

Lars shook my hand, but I guarantee you he couldn’t have described me to anyone later. His eyes were all for the dazzling movie star.

“If I’d have known you were coming in today, we could have arranged a tour! Listen, can I call you later? I had some interesting stuff across my desk in the last week, I wanna run a few things past you.”

Linking her arm through his, Gretchen slowly herded Hairy Angry Lars off the set, picking her way through the cables and equipment with the ease of long practice. “Sure! Just call Reggie, he can set something up. It was good to see you again!”

Five minutes later, she managed to extract herself from his blatant ass-kissing, and as we walked away I heard him yell, “Well, what are you all standing around with your thumbs up your asses for? Reset!”

Gretchen made it all the way out to the street before all the color drained from her face and her knees buckled under her.

“Easy. I gotcha.” I wrapped my arm around her waist before she could fall, and she leaned on me, trying to keep from hyperventilating.

“I don’t…I don’t understand…that man was going to kill me….” Her eyes were wide, shocky, staring at the teeming street around us without really seeing anything. I debated on slapping her, but settled on some firm talk first.

“Gretchen.” When that didn’t work, I gave her a little shake. “Gretchen!” Finally, she looked at me. “Do you have your cell?”